Of Thunderstorms, Terriers and New Projects

At 2:00 a.m., I woke up thanks to a loud thunderclap and by a terrier who was tossed in my bed. It seems that Alvah was keeping G up and it was decided that I would deal with the fearful dog. For two hours, Alvah paced, panted, and shook in fear of the storm that was raging.

I tried to calm him down and get him to sleep, but after 30 minutes of hearing his toenails click against the floorboards and his half pants and whining, I finally decided to turn on the lights and cleanout my emails. And that's what I did until 4:30 in the morning. Suffice it to say, I am tired and the article I was planning to research and write has been put off until tomorrow morning.

I accomplished a few things and that included posting this week's NYT bestseller list on Alvah's Books, write a cookbook review, and go to the market to get some ingredients for tonight's noodle dinner.

Since getting a new computer that runs beautifully and doesn't freeze, one of the new projects planned is to learn more than the basics on Photoshop. We'll see how creative I can get.

Back from a Long Hiatus

For the past month I've been working on the book review site--now named Alvah's Books. Traffic has been increasing steadily and I have a slew of books to review. Suffice it to say (or write) I've been busy.

I'll be back to posting daily on this site starting tomorrow. Plus I'll be updating it, adding a Blogroll and making it pretty.

Julius Redux and Redux

One of the authors I reviewed and I have an email exchange and he was curious about Julius. I tried to give him a synopsis, which I'm still having trouble writing, and gave him the two prologues. He liked it very much and wrote that I should send it out ASAP to an agent. 

I know it's no where ready to send, but it did provide me with that much needed motivation to keep writing and revising. And that's what I plan to do for the rest of today: revising. Maybe by the end of the summer, I'll have a finished novel to send to an agent? 

The Waddling Terrier

Alvah, the Jack Russell terrier, is a wee bit on the roly-poly side. If he were brown he'd look like a giant tootsie roll. Two days ago, I decided that he would be my running training buddy. I mapped out a 1/4 mile trek (it's actually our typical walk around the neighborhood) and we ran/walked it. At the second stretch of the loop, he slowed down quite a bit. So I stopped running (it's really more of a shuffle on my part) and we did a brisk walk. At the third and fourth stretch, we ran the rest of the way.  I can't speak for him, but I was sore from that little bit of exertion.

Yesterday, Alvah had a rest day, but I shuffled, feeling all the sore muscles in my legs every bit of the way. Today, we'll go out shortly and see if he's as energetic and if I've improved somewhat. 

The BIG goal is to run the entire loop by the end of the week.  

Reading but No Writing

I've been reading so much, but I haven't been writing as much as I would like. Not even on this blog. Shame on me again.

For the past few weeks I've been on night owl mode and that does allow me to spend time on the writing, but I'm not feeling very motivated. I don't whether it's a little of procrastinating or whether I simply have too much on my plate that I'm simply having a hard time focusing. 

What I do know is that I am spending too much time on Twitter. I'm trying to find content for Exiled at the Beach Book Reviews apart from the book reviews. I'm also trying to recruit other writers for books that I simply don't have the time to read or for content--essays and other reviews in genres that I don't normally read. 

In addition to the reading, I'm attempting to learn as much as I can about social media marketing, (that's why I'm on Twitter so often) and I started with a HTML tutorial, plus I'm still working on my ESL certificate.

I guess it's no wonder I'm not writing. My plate is really full. And to top it all off, I started running. 

Am I going to give any of it up? I can't. It's all career related and I need to exercise to combat stress and to stay physically healthy. 

It's baby steps. I'll start logging again regularly and work on my fiction a little everyday. I just have to figure out where to fit it in.

The Alvah Bessie Papers

As noted in Tuesday's post, I went to the Tamiment Libray to do some research on the American Medical Bureau. While I was there, I requested to see Alvah Bessie's papers. There were six boxes in total and when I discovered the original manuscript of Men in Battle, my heart jumped and my hands trembled as I gently leafed through those pages. What an amazing experience it was to actually touch those same papers that he wrote, edited, and thumbed through. 

One of the last folders I looked through was one of the ALBA reunions that honored Alvah. There were a bunch of letters and telegrams from so many "bold names" including Ring Lardner Jr., Lester Cole, Vladimir Posner and telegram for La Pasionaria--Dolores Ibarurri. Very impressive stuff. Alvah also had a bunch of letters thanking people for coming to his party. One letter to Lester Cole, which wasn't sent, was a scolding. It seems that Lester left before Alvah gave his speech. The famous crankiness really came out in that short note. 

There were so many folders that I just skimmed through them, but there were at least three that I like to look at again, these were speeches he made to a few womens' groups in LA about Spain. He gave those shortly before he went to prison for contempt of Congress.

Those six boxes and their contents gave me so many ideas for Julius.  I can't wait to return and go through them again.

 

7:15 to Manhattan

I have an appointment with destiny. Tomorrow is a big research day at the Tamiment Library with a side of lunch at Veselka with one of my oldest friends, JC. 

It's been months since I traveled west to my old stomping grounds and I miss it terribly. Back to the hustle, the noise, the traffic, the crowds of downtown Manhattan. God, I miss everything about New York. 

Well, I miss the New York I loved. The one that wasn't ruined by the wanna be Sex in the City narcissists, the Wall Street pigs, the parasitic real estate developers and the hipster clones. I want my New York back. I miss the hookers, pimps, drug dealers, even the squeegee men.

I want the Lower Eastside to be poor and Jewish; the East Village to be gritty, the West Village to be radical and bohemian. Anything above 23rd Street can go the way of the suburbs, but I want my downtown to bare its soul and its heart. 

I can wish right? 

I'm taking the Jitney to the city since the blasted train is on a limited schedule. It's a three hour ride so I need to make sure that the phone is charged along with the iPod, and bring reading material, note pad and plenty of pens. 

The purpose of this journey is to research the American Medical Bureau to Aid Spanish Democracy. This was the philanthropic organization that raised funds to help the Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War. The main man to head this was Dr. Edward Barskey. 

The article is supposed to be 2,500 words long with photos. I'll spend the entire weekend working on it and hope it actually gets published.  And if doesn't, well at least I'll be able to say I had lunch at Veselka.